meeting with opposition members is one thing for taking part in rallies that's interference and domestic affairs russia's prime minister calls for e.u. politicians to stop meddling in ukraine's business as police in kiev give pro e.u. protesters a deadline to decamped from government building. tributes pouring out for the death of nelson mandela we'll look at his journey from ostracized rubble to a global symbol of compassion and equality. and. build on my wife jo my self-esteem illegal gambling machines that are getting increasing numbers of brits hoax we discover bookies who keep the cash coming in as government regulation flounders.

very good morning to you if you just joined us my name's kevin owen you're seeing r.t. live from moscow right now it's just after midnight here in moscow wherever you're watching around the world all right our top story the protesters in kiev of the given five days to stop disrupting government departments opposition activists have been blocking most key institutions for much of this past week it's a topic that would have been tough to avoid i guess for the country's president victory on a covert he met his russian counterpart in sochi earlier a sensible to talk about economic revival with more on that meeting is a winning. the meeting was a shorter working meeting and the two presidents have discussed largely the economic aspects it really is no surprise economy is something that is why the importance of such was this type of a flight for the ukrainian president on his way back from china where he has met with his chinese colleagues and. carried on the quite productive economic talks in

fact the president said that he has signed a number of deals amounting to roughly eight billion dollars in investments now while unocal which was trying to figure out a way for ukraine to solve its financial issues here in here we had to literally teeming not just with the ukrainian protesters but also with western politicians are one of them in particular victoria nuland who has paid a visit to the tent city that was set up here by the protesters essentially expressing the u.s. support for the ukrainian opposition and for the protesters as well as internal and has also held close talks to with. the darling of the ukrainian opposition among others that we have seen among the protesters on the square were foreign ministers from sweden germany and the netherlands while he has hope that the talks with europe will renew under a new president essentially hinting at the ultimate goal of the ukrainian protest

and that is the current government and the president to step down the interests of western politicians and what is essentially ukrainian domestic affairs has drawn sharp criticism of the. russians prime minister to be preventive jury your traditional q. and a with russian journalist. but i can imagine how our german partners would have felt if russia's foreign minister decided to attend a rally that was being held against german rule i don't think they would consider it a friendly step out of a meeting with opposition members is one thing but taking part in rallies that's interference in domestic offense the minister the prime minister little allyson exam the public told us that some foreign politicians positioning just doesn't tally with the democratic standards. this is a clear clear appearance in the internal affairs of a sovereign country and they're not even hiding more so this is something that should be unacceptable as

a democratic standard you just have to have call our country to make its own sovereign choice and western diplomats are just not doing that and they're not really concerning themselves about your actual situation or the benefit of the country or the people in far you're just looking at it from the economic standpoint you are the ones that have nothing to offer. slogans about democracy human rights and so it's really just a big your per chance game and it's pretty simple actually. world's mourning the loss of one of the twentieth century's most iconic leaders now some mandela who died aged ninety five after a long illness so africa's first black president of the man who led the country out of decades of apartheid to democracy spreaders finally is being nursed at home and

you haven't spurred crowds gathered in the city to grieve and celebrate the legacy of the man they knew was madiba for a state trooper on december the fifteenth expected to be buried in a private family summer village in accordance with his wishes world leaders praised as a hero of our time and joy for justice some of the most glowing tributes indeed have come from the united kingdom when laura smith reports. here at the south african embassy in london and public buildings all around the city flags are flying at half mast to mark the death of nelson mandela there are around half a million south africans living in this country and some of them have come here to the embassy to lay flowers and pay tribute to the passing of mandela and of course tributes flooding in from elsewhere to the royal family prince william for example has called him an extraordinary and inspiring man the queen has paid a personal tribute talking of the great warmth she feels when she thinks of mandela

saying that he worked tirelessly for his country and his legacy is the peaceful south africa that we see today and political chippies the flooding in from all over the world lead in this country by david cameron he called mandela a towering figure a true global hero and says a great light has gone out. but this is all in her own around if we look just at the conservative movement for example in one thousand nine hundred seventy margaret thatcher who slammed him as a terrorist the a.n.c. could never rule south africa anyone who thought so it was. david cameron also around that made a trip to south africa as a rising star in the conservative. movement and they were low being against sanctions on the apartheid movement so most certainly. now it's not clear whether david cameron was personally involved but certainly the organization he belonged to was and it was a similar picture in the us but actually even more delayed in terms of his

rehabilitation if you like mandela was on the terror list and he and his associates were removed from the database intil as late as two thousand and eight nine years after his presidency of south africa was already over now my colleague paula steer has been looking at this in more detail at mandela's life over in south africa. he's the man who pulled a troubled and divided land back from the brink of civil war the man who after twenty seven tough years behind bars walks free from prison in his heart was not revenge and i think that his greatest legacy to this country is reconciliation but in the last three decades the world time to sleep polished the image of nelson mandela and image recognized around the world only coca-cola is better known better men who struggle for racial equality again south africa's ruling white minority had a dark side the world has conveniently forgotten about nelson mandela been leader

of the struggle. a radical. someone. embraced violence and as a necessary political instrument at a particular juncture in our history this house was the secret headquarters of the african national congress it was here in the early sixty's that mandela and his comrades launched the armed struggle it was also here that most of them were wasted put on trial and sentenced to life in prison south african journalist chris bishop believes the one nine hundred sixty four trial that saw mandela and his comrades sentenced to life helped turn the world in their favor during the trial. these gentlemen who were on trial the rivonia trial as they went from being the accused of being people on in the dark as slowly transformed they became the benjamin franklin's of africa they became the freedom fighters they

began the man of principle who is standing up merely for the rights of others and it's only to turn world opinion around from a vile terrorist to one of the greatest freedom fighters to have ever walked the earth the story of nelson mandela is remarkable a man who stood up for the rights of people everywhere but also a familiar tale of governments putting a garland of. i was around your neck one day and of rope the next point to our t. johannesburg south africa. read more fight for fairness which defined nelson mandela's life as well as reactions to his legacy and death at r.t. dot com. they're gambling devices which can drain all your cash in just seconds but in britain they're booming however rules to tighten up on fixed old's betting machines known as the cocaine of the high street the crack cocaine of the eyes to even these days of floundering and the sort of first reports

that means payday them for the bookmakers. there are the high risk high stakes gaming machines this in the u.k. betting industry more than a billion pounds each year to. shore fix. the machine. and to comply. to one hundred every twenty seconds this is a twenty second cycle every twenty seconds. three hundred pounds my children my wife my job my self esteem. ok. the government's two thousand and five gambling act limited the number of. high street betting shops are allowed to have to four machines now more recently in

response to both public and political concern. has released a voluntary code of conduct aimed at encouraging socially responsible behavior but we've seen evidence that among some leading. everyone seems to be playing strictly by the rules inside this labrat says a glass petition it enables the store to carry not full but eight forty machines which are the ones. that you. are. in a statement about the store. this shop was a concept shop and there are no plans to open any further shops of this kind. in terms of. responsible behind a completely. ex army major just in ase well how devastating the effects of

a gambling addiction can be a last point was the day when. my mom my dad and my little brother he's actually taller than me. and just said that we've got to get you out of here. and i was just crying and. that's when i lost all my pride and i was completely humiliated but it's great because that was the day i realized my recovery happened justin's written a book about his experience and is helping others on their rates to recovery but with scant research into the effects of these machines and as the industry seeks to maximize profits campaign is warning that not taking action eva full tease is one gamble person concert foods to take so. the london the

shale gas struggles about to resume in romania particular this weekend we've got details on that coming up plus why there was a fast food walk out of the states so after the break this is international. technology innovation all the developments from around russia we've got the future covered.

i think people. should have you with us here on r t today i roll researcher. logan french launched a military operation in the central african republic aimed at curbing a surge in sectarian violence earlier a un security council resolution authorized french troops to join an african peacekeeping mission the latest clashes between rival militias in the capital bangui of killed over one hundred people muslim rebels who seized power in march of fighting christians there who support the ousted president and this is sparked

fears that the conflict could expand into a full blown sectarian war well sometimes branded the policemen of africa france has remained active on the continent ever since the colonial era as you sell them out there it's a map of france's former colonies over the past decade alone france has led interventions in the democratic republic of congo ivory coast chad and most recently mali that's aside from its involvement in libya two as for the current conflict fronts refused a request to intervene from the central african republic during a rebellion earlier this year then it said it would not back a corrupt regime however the recent bloodshed prompted paris to pledge immediate action this time foreign affairs columnist summoned his dell from britain's guardian newspaper thinks the french are taking on a highly dangerous endeavor nonetheless. the french are keen to reestablish some authority and some national interest in areas where they will fall in the colonial era interventions are very high risk it much easier to get in and to get out there

only sending another thousand troops out of there are fourteen hundred troops in total as the french contingent when this deployment is complete for a country which is much bigger than france and the chances are that you know there's always the rest more more men more material on all resources will be sucked in and the conflict will intensify in mali for instance although an intervention also supposed to be quite short and again you can hear the french are still there in quite some numbers and the charge is the militants the armed gangs the cameraman order from sudan and chad and so on are still not mostly intact and in a suggestion is that the french pullback or lethal just resume their attempt to take over the country. giant chevron searching for shale gas in a romanian village is been the center of empty fracking protests for over two months now more actions expected this weekend but this is what really this week as

police clashed with demonstrators local newspaper said forty campaigners would be police for setting up camp next to the fields targeted for drilling gases extracted by pumping top seed fluid into the ground the fear is that the chemicals it contains that accumulates in the soul of the water table even in the air evaporating up into the atmosphere environmental safety campaign george barda told me that big business the government of closer than ever was shell matters what you see essentially is this battle between big business and the interests of the people and a consistent pattern both in the u.k. and roumania where you're seeing major figures from the energy industry moving into into government directly david cameron as i came came to power on the promise of being the greenest government ever and what we've seen is exactly the opposite in rumania it's exactly the same scenario we see a leader says no to fracking because the people want it and then when he's in power he starts dancing to the tune as a these major players like chevron and what we've seen recently is this very brutal

action of the peaceful protests that have been there for a number of months and rumania all the entrances to the village were shut off it was a military style operation none of the press was allowed to go in there there are reports of incredible brutality george the problem the bottom line here is that the general public not as may be. involved no not even a little concerned about the environment that got kids to bring that little card to run they got jobs to do they want cheap fuel this is one of the lawyers being both here and in romania that you know. maybe it will poison your children but it's going to give you to the people in neighboring plots of land don't pay the ones that have to suffer the consequences the huge increase rates of cancer of all sorts of respects your problems thousands of families are being forced to move out of their areas. and one of the reasons that we're not hearing more about the specific stories of illness is that in order to get any kind of compensation from these fucking companies they have to settle out of court because they can't begin to

fight the legal battles that iran can afford much more on that story online from us and also without t.v. dot com from tiffany to caribbean cruises a decade long spending spree but dozens of russian diplomats in america's been on earth they could now find themselves in trouble being blamed for defrauding the u.s. medicare system to fund those lavish lifestyles we get more about those allegations online. and details about small britain schools of seeing classrooms abandon eastern china and how artificial rain now they think could maybe be used to dilute the country's ongoing suffocating pollution. right the city. first for you and i would think that your. recorders twitter. and instagram.

would be in the. developments in a story of in following a week of videos emerged of twelve syrian and lebanese nuns held hostage since monday by radical islamist rebel groups in the clip broadcast by al-jazeera one of the women said they were all in good health and would be released in two days the nuns were seized from him on a street during opposition assault on a predominately christian town the rebels holding them hostage at earlier demand of the damascus free a thousand women from prison in exchange the christian minority in syria's been increasingly targeted by opposition extremists. meantime in pakistan's capital hundreds have protested against american drone strikes the rally was staged by the terry care in south party led by the former cricket star can demonstrators chanted anti u.s. slogans and demanded an immediate end to all drone attacks in the country the strikes are deeply unpopular in pakistan but american officials say the crucial in the fight against terrorism. extreme wind storms still battering europe the

u.k.'s bore the brunt of it for the last twenty four hours or so thousands of people to move to safety is the worst tidal surge in sixty years the eastern british coast across the continent to that disaster is known to have killed at least eight people many homes have been left the electricity in sweden and norway and didn't germany's hamburg floodwaters rose to six meters the highest level there in decades. the streets of catalonia in northeast spain filled with both pro and anti nationalist demonstrators friday across parts alone or there were flag waving protests both for and against the region's independence which accounts for about a fifth of spain's economy incidentally despite the government imagery in madrid and wanted to keep the areas that controlled all suggest that most people there are against this an og from the european partnership for independence explains why. fifty seven percent the ones that we wanted that announced and only

a twenty percent that one simply don't want to dance so obviously with these results now we have very optimistic we can have our people and now we just want to dance future for i will pick those who can decide about socialist policies like immigration and cultural axtell no relations like any other nation as a state and that's what it's fair and that is what it's about democracy. the fast food retail workers in the u.s. staged a nation or a national wide strike on thursday calling for an increase to the minimum wage president obama's pledge to push for higher salaries for industry but that was back in february and critics say since then little is being done when important i was at the protest in new york. what began here in new york city one year ago with just two hundred employees has exploded into arguably the biggest wave of protest in the history of america's fast food industry thousands of fast food employees in more

than one hundred cities throughout this country have walked off the job thursday demanding an increase in minimum wage and the right to unionize now this movement is being spearheaded by an organization called fast food forward and the fast food workers that have joined the strike work at major restaurants like wendy's mcdonald's burger king and k.f.c. now while fast food remains a two hundred billion dollar industry the median wage for the service workers like the cooks and the cashiers in the group nationwide is just eight dollars and ninety four cents an hour here in new york city it's even worse with the minimum wage being seven dollars and twenty five cents an hour now because of the low wages and many of the employees if not most employed at fast food restaurants are living in poverty i don't know why by the grace of god i am. i am in

a shelter trying to get out of there and i can do it because i don't get paid that much some struggling you know and that's why i'm here to see what this week. for me in the ass and for right to take you to fam you have the single people next america away and i believe all fall there's invision a country not full cooperation before the working man and by mother make way too much money for us to be treated like this and we're the one who give them the money back with the one earns and then it's like we're not earning them because they're the one who takes the money home to make matters worse this problem is only growing lonely jobs have accounted for the bulk of new jobs added during the so-called us. carbury in addition to retail at fast food are among the fastest growing sectors in the u.s. economy now what these protesters are demanding is that minimum wage be raised to

two hundred dollars an hour so far only one city in washington state has met those demands this crowd around me they're doing so to quite sure a basic and decent living wage an opportunity to just step one foot into the worlds of the so called american dream reporting from new york marina hard to. welcome but she with more live news from around the globe and around thirty minutes time next. the continuing and consistent rise of china beat the clearing restrictive fly zones or a critical few on the subject of buying us dollar debt in fact it would appear china is tearing a page from washington's playbook to make rules to feed its geopolitical interests . sell the workers

more to their lives for their pension account there is cash that you can be used to leverage all kinds of a synthetic obligations on wall street so that money has to be stolen clearly whether you're in the u.k. or detroit whether you birmingham manchester sheffield or betrayed your pensions are up for grabs from the shysters on wall street led by the chinese there's a number ten and number eleven of boris johnson they want to take your money and they want to turn it into all kinds of flora and fauna the riches spinning the globe redwood giving an income for doing nothing but when it does.

president obama strikes where this is called into question declining poll numbers show that americans don't have faith in their leader in chief just how far down as you fall and can we improve his image before it's too late frank. months gives us the latest on obama's unpopularity plus p.r. strategist howard bragman and political commentator tanya acker on what the president means to do now to regain the confidence of the american people it's all next on politicking with larry. welcome to this week's politicking we're talking about the president's declining

poll numbers and no one better to break it all down for us the real story with the pollster and republican strategist frank luntz one of my favorite people all right the recent c.n.n. poll of polls and frank by the way is a republican strategist a best selling author and he's been a commentator an analyst on fox news and c.b.s. recent c.n.n. poll of polls shows obama's approval rating at forty one percent fifty five percent disapprove the only people lower of congress who have faith what's going on frank first of congress's got it eight percent nine percent job approval rating khadafi had a fifteen percent job approval rating and that was among the people who killed him hitler had eleven percent yeah bug juice and so it shows you how far congress has fallen the i want to take it one step broader which is that we don't trust any institutions right now it's not just the presidency that's in challenges that's being in check and it's not just congress it's business leaders it's cultural leaders it's the media it's everybody we think is out for themselves and against us

there's no cronkite there is no there's no arbiter and there's nobody that we trust mother teresa is gone nelson mandela's been off the political state there's really nobody that we can look to and say that someone i believe in you know had it by the way was colin powell but then after the iraqi situation even he lost that kind of bipartisan is no doubt figure in america that americans can say yes there's one but she's not political and that's oprah winfrey. she's the most trusted most respected individual in the country and in some cases across the globe hillary would come in hot politically though and she's very divisive social come in very high among women very high among democrats very well among republicans of those where she could win though she is clearly more than just viable i think that she's the front runner but going back to a bollock is it was a good thing that the challenge with him is that if the polarization this country is so deep that republicans democrats can't talk to each other they can't dine with

each other right now i like to joke that democrats laugh louder are much more fun to hang out with but they always stick you with a check at the end of the evening right now we're not talking to each other and so this divide has become a chasm but in every poll in the past obama always came out well in likability yes we liked him because because they thought he was honest because they thought he was trying the problem with health care is that now they're not convinced of that he looked a straight me i and said again and again if you want to keep your health care you can well it doesn't work that way if the insurance companies have to cut you off let's presume he's not a liar was he misinformed they do not know is own bill to be insurance companies stab them what happened or are you saying he's a liar well first off i'm never use that language because it's so polarizing and so divisive one of the reasons why we've lost civility in this country is because we accuse our opponents of things that are just awful.